Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1887-10-25
A HARD SHOW.
Nathaniel ]. Coffin Gives Further Par.
ticulars Regarding His Struggle at
Sea.

Gcuiars hegaroing HIS Struggle Al
The following letter will explain the facts
in connection with the story of man who
was ship-wrecked and who barely escaped
with his life:
HALLowELL, Oct. %, '87.
10 the Editor of the Kennebee Journal;
DEAR SIR thank you for the article in
serted for me by way of correcting statements
made in the Boston Globe aud find that 7 wss
not mistaken in supposing it would be of little
use to notify the Globe of the errors therein
published.
| ind by other papers still more gross
error in substituting the name of nv brother.
John Norton Coffin for Nathaniel johnson
Coffin, plausible reason for which is that
my brother John was of the party who started
from Portsmouth with me and he did sail
from Panama to San Francisco in company
with my Old captain, John II. Jackson, while
was left on the Isthmus to follow in the
canoe as soon as she was completed The
mistake is very strange, to say the least of il.
as both myself and brother are well acauaint-
ed In Boston, and the circumstances are we'll
known there. He was also lieutenant in
the 9Th Massachusetts Battery, which made
1t easy to print j. n. for N j. Coffin.
Ihere was an event of importance which
TRANSFERRED on the Isthmus, which / hope you
Will think interesting enough to give an inser-
ton in your valuable paper, viz. In the early
part of 1919, there were several thousands
OF American citizens on the Isthmus of Darien
with no means of transportation to San Fran
cisco and our party of % took a metallic life
boat from Gorgona, the head waters of the
Shagress river to the head waters of the Rio
Grande on the Pacific side of the Isthmus and
thence to the Bay of Panama where she was
bought by a company of eleven men for
Sll00 and started for San Francisco.
After had left the canoe and shipped on
| the ship Roland and while laying two and one
half miles outside of Pazatlan one fine even
| ing, was surprised to see the life boat sail
along side of us. They had in vain tried to
double Cape st. Lucas for weeks and came in
10 fazatlan to engage passage to San Fran
CISCO They engaged passage with US on
| the Roland and the life boat was made fast to
the stern davits, and we were wrecked but a
few days afterwards. We were hove short,
! ready to weigh anchor and start with the
first fair wind, when at about midnight,
hurricane drove US sunken reef.
The crew and officers attempted to go ashore
| in the whale boat just as she struck the reef,
but the first breaker took the boat on board
duu uSI W pieces against tDe mast.
One fellow, the cooper, made out to catch
and hold himself in the fore shrouds. All
the rest persisted except the boatswain who
was trying TO make sail at the time. The hurri-
cane came on the ship, struck her stern post
first. As the anchor held her head out to
sea, and as her stern lifted on the reef her
miZZen mast and all aft of it was like a
basket of chips in the boiling surf The
next breaker made chips of all aft of the
main mast, and the next took her foremost
and all att of it away, when the anchor
became able to hold the Samson post, wind
lass bits, and all timbers forward of the
foremost, together with the bowsprit and
Jibboom from going on the reef, but there
was not a single plank left boted on her.
There were 10 out of 69 persons saved. My
self and three others swan ashore and 10
were picked off from her bowspritin the morn
ing. We who swan ashore landed on small is
land or large rock two miles from Nazatlan.
We were all perfectly naked but as they had a
quantity of wood coal in bags, and many of
them were thrown high on the rocks, by
cutting hole in each corner of the end of a
sack and Il slot lengthwise, by thrusting an
arm through each corner hole and my head
through the slot in the center of the end |
| had lmproyised shirt rs good as could be
obtained on the premises. Then opening
each end of another sack drew 1t on for a
kind of petticoat. Our feet were badly lace
rated and we bound coal sacks on them aud
were carried to Nazlllan in that style of
costume. But the life boat that | had pio
neered the road for from the Atlantic to the
Pacific Ocean, was left high above everything
else on the island, spiked on the sharp rocks,
| believe all of 40 or so fifty feet above the
sea level. The American Consul gave me II
calico shirt and a pair of duck pants, which
was all | was worth when | landed in San
Francisco, TO which place he also paid my
passage in the Brig Dos Amigos. When |
landed | found the company dissolved, some
of them worth $4,000, while | was 10 debt
to my brother tor suit of clothes
Yours Respectfully,
NATHANIEL j. COFFIN.